Make Smarter Mobile Apps with Push Notifications

Our community is constantly adding cool new widgets and modules to the Mendix App Store. If you’re not aware of everything the Mendix App Store has to offer, check out our previous reviews on UI building blocks and the ChartsJS widget family. This week I’m highlighting the Push Notifications Connector, which is a handy module that allows your Mendix mobile apps to push alerts directly to a device using the native notification interface.

Push notifications with configurable titles and text

Why use push notifications?

We live in a world of smart apps. Applications think, decide, and take action without any user interaction. It’s no longer good enough to send an e-mail or change a status when these actions are taken! And users can’t be expected to continually log in for updates. Integrated application experiences are the norm, and push notifications allow an application to proactively communicate intelligence. Apps should reach out and put key information directly in front of users. Now, with the Push Notification Connector, your Mendix apps can be smarter and users can be more productive.

The features

The Push Notification Connector module leverages native capabilities provided by both Android and iOS devices. The module uses services made available via both Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) and Apple Push Notifications service (APNs). As a result, push notifications are possible on any mobile device: Android, iOS, or Windows.

Icons can be customized for all apps

Thanks to the Push Notification Module, setup and implementation is a breeze. Sending out push notifications is easily modeled in the Mendix Modeler and is consolidated into a single Java action in the module.

Sending push notifications is achieved through a simple microflow

Of course, setting up notifications for the Android and iOS platforms requires some steps outside of your app. Fortunately, the module includes administration configuration snippets that can be dropped right into your model for fast configuration.

Including an administration snippet simplifies configuration

Getting started

Never worked with push notifications before? Don’t worry! The Push Notifications Connector Demo project contains helpful workflow steps and presents all the work that must be done outside the Mendix Modeler. The project provides step-by-step instructions for PhoneGap setup, API key retrieval, and final configuration. You will be pushing notifications directly from your app within minutes.

Learn more

Our Push Notifications documentation provides you with all the technical details for getting push notifications working in your app. Like many Mendix modules, this module is completely open source and is continually updated with new features and implements. You can track the latest progress through the community GitHub project.